Friday, May 1, 2026
EIGHTH TOWER'S MUSIC FOR ANCIENT CATACOMBS
Raffaele Pezzella has announced a new Eighth Tower audio anthology: Music for Ancient Catacombs.
The album/CD digs deep into the recess of heart, soul and mind, recalling a disinterred time of bold adventures, harrowing peril and sweet, sequestered surrealism.
The selections are sometimes welcoming and sometimes forbidding, but no matter the tonality, one's imagination will be stoked.
The contents include (artists on the left, titles on the right):
1) Kammarheit - In Quiet Depths
2) Sublimatio Mortis - A pilgrimage towards nothingness
3) New Risen Throne - Entering the Stone Circle
4) Mario Lino Stancat - Somnium
5) SILENI - WIthin the Vaults
6) Ashtoreth & Penumbral Aethyr - Khthon
7) Nerthus - Missa tenebrarum
8) Guru Bobol - linthre
9) Dapalis Sepolcri - La Fosse des Cholereiques (A.G.T.L.L.)
10) Adonai Atrophia - The Lowest Chamber
11) progettosonoro - Underground Sorrow
12) PNEVMMA - kry-pti
13) Aconis - Sanctum in the Depths (bonus dgt track)
This sagacious curation is much too epic to ignore. Preorder at
https://eighthtowerrecords.bandcamp.com/album/music-for-ancient-catacombs
I SAW DEEP WATER (2026)
Rennie (Die Hard 2/Elm Street 4/Prison) Harlin is again in full, action swing with his latest, Deep Water, a companion piece to his previous, sharks-attack effort, Deep Blue Sea, with this one written by S.P. Krause, Shayne Armstrong and Peter Bridges (et al) and co-produced by Kiss' Gene Simmons.
Deep Water is in groove with another plane-disaster, shark picture, Claudio Fah's No Way Up, as well as Tommy Wirkola's recent Thrash, in that they both allude to the infamous, WWII, shark incident that Quint recounts in Jaws, depicted in Robert Iscove's Mission of the Shark: The Saga of the U.S.S. Indianapolis and Mario Van Peebles' U.S.S. Indianapolis: Men of Courage. (Incidentally, in regard to the Jaws saga, there's also a colorful, Jaws 2 nod within the plot. You'll know it when you see it.)
With Deep Water, we get a 747, which while traveling from L.A. to Shanghai, crashes straight into the Pacific Ocean (thanks to a laptop-led explosion), leaving its passengers as scattered, mako bait.
The plane's first officer, Aaron (The Dark Knight/I Frankenstein) Eckhart's Ben, is the hero, a troubled one cut from Harlin's Cliffhanger cloth, mirroring Sylvester Stallone's Gabe Walker, who in his own right mirrors any number of conscientious, Irwin Allen, disaster-movie heroes.
Though Sir Ben Kingsley's Rich, a captain ready to retirement, adds a distinguished but doomed presence to the story, circumstances force Ben to the long-run forefront. However, his guidance is a hard squeeze, considering that the passengers are being taken down one by one, thus raising the panic quotient a hundredfold. (It all comes down to "Who's next?": anything but reassuring.)
The stranded co-participants are headlined by the heedless Jaya, played by Kelly (Plane/Beast 2026) Gale (who holds top, marquee prominence); Cora, played by Molly (Apostacy) Brown Wright, a snippy but anchoring, little girl; and Dan, played by Angus (Fury Road/Insidious) Sampson, his character being the uncouth jerk you'll cheer to be devoured. However, all those involved enrich the dilemma's ups and downs by conveying a palpable, shared panic, with variances among them (good, bad and in-between, some smart, some stupid), which would reflect any realistic, incidental gathering forced into a high-stakes, if not condemned, circumstance.
Eckhart knocks it outta the park, though, as a man with the world on his shoulders, doing his best to reassure the passengers that everything will be okay, even when the gory evidence says otherwise. He dons an adamant visage that could crack at any moment, and because of this, he becomes an identifiable focus for the plot. Everything revolves around him. Everything (in particular the tension) works because of him. He is Deep Water, pure and simple.
Though Deep Water isn't heavy on groundbreaking complexity any more than No Way Up or Thrash, like the latter, it moves right along, creating a heart-pounding diversion and despite its curious, limited release, works as a swell, scary way to christen 2026's big-screen, summer suspense.
THE ORIGINAL DAWN OF THE DEAD'S END
I discovered an interesting video regarding Dawn of the Dead 1979 (and I'm sticking with 1979, because that's when the movie hit mass distribution; a test-run preview occurred in 1978, no more or less; it's an official, 1979 release, period.). The video comes from Captain Gold and delves into the original ending conceived by George A. Romero for his flesh-eating zombie epic, which would have depicted Peter (Ken Foree) and the pregnant Fran (Galen Ross) committing suicide: Peter would have shot himself in the head and Fran would have raised hers into their helicopter's blades.
I'm glad Peter and Fran survived at the end of the movie, although if they had perished, the outcome would have better mirrored Night of the Living Dead's. Also, I've never had a problem with characters dying in movies (unless it's a dog or cat and then my feathers tend to get ruffled). For the most part, great poignancy flows from a major character's demise: case in point, Godzilla's "fatal" meltdown in Godzilla vs Destoroyah. (I know a clueless crybaby who still bemoans that one, to which I say, "Grow the hell up! Imagi characters never truly die. They're designed for resurrection [though sometimes they reappear through prologues, but same damn difference], or have you missed the obvious, perennial point of Star Trek II & III or how about the clever flow between Logan and Deadpool & Wolverine? Oh, and getting back to good ol' Gojira, how many times have we've seen the big guy stomp across the screen after death and/or defeat before or since Destroyah? Capisce?")
Anyhow, Captain Gold's sincere synopsis of the considered Dawn of the Dead ending has been inserted above, but the essay speculates as well on what may have happened to Peter and Fran after the credits rolled. In other words, how long would they have survived beyond the mall? The video's conjecture and the viewers' comments resonate with me. I think they'll resonate with you, too. Why not give the piece a nice, zombie-fied whirl?
I SAW APEX
Apex, directed by Baltasar (Beast 2022/Adrift) Kormakur and scripted by Jeremy (Aftermath/The Purge) Robbins, is a new, survivalist/escape thriller. It echoes author Richard Connell's The Most Dangerous Game and so many of its run-for-your-life adaptations and offshoots, including Apex 2021 (an unrelated but mirroring effort with Bruce Willis and Neal McDonough), Cliffhanger, Deliverance, Hunter's Blood, Rituals, Wake in Fright, The River Wild, Speak No Evil, Ready or Not, Send Help and through basic (though no less potent) allusion, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, Motel Hell, I Spit on Your Grave and The Hills Have Eyes. The movie also depicts the unbridled brunt of a woman's endurance, not only to overcome nature's austere elements, but lost love.
Charlize (Fury Road/Prometheus/Mighty Joe Young) Theron portrays Sasha, whose spouse, Tommy (Eric Bana), dies in an Australian, rock-climbing mishap (enacted in the movie's opening). Tommy's death drives Sasha to return to his Outback turf, where she meets Taron (The Rocketman/The Kingsman/Robin Hood) Egerton's affable Ben.
Though Sasha is told not to venture out on her own for adventurous thrills, she dismisses the warning. It's Ben who gives her the encouragement to do so at a pitstop, where the vicinity's kangaroo hunters give her some flirtatious ribbing, but when Ben re-emerges at her camp, she realizes his kindness is a ruse. Ben wants to hunt and kill her, which pushes Sasha's survival mode to the apex.
What ensues rolls like a forbidding, cat-and-mouse travelogue, with Kormakur churning an atmosphere reminiscent of a Werner Herzog movie: idyllic on top, though dangerous below.
From a basic, horror vantage, Ben more than does his job. Though the deeper details of his life are kept (for better or worse) vague, we do learn that he may have been a Bates-esque mama's boy and that he's been killing people, chopping up their carcasses and selling such to the pitstop as beef jerky. Indeed, he's a human monster and like many of his cinematic type, proud of it.
Perhaps to its detriment, Apex isn't packed with many surprises. One knows the layout pretty much upfront, with events never mounting toward anything too unexpected, unless one counts Ben's charming deflection and his big, beef-jerky reveal. This may not please all viewers, who may find the story too straightforward. Those, however, who enjoy the symbolic strife of life (and how to derail it) will be inclined to embrace Apex's rugged palette.
For those of either persuasion, Apex awaits at Netflix.
SCREAM SIRENS: A CLASSIC MONSTERS OF THE MOVIES TRIBUTE
With thoughts and fears turning to female, horror figures in recent days and years (Kathryn Newton's Lisa Frankenstein, Mia Goth's Elizabeth Lavenza, Jessie Buckley's The Bride!, Alisha Weir's Abigail and Natalie Grace's Katie), their faithful followers will find Classic Monsters of the Movies' Scream Sirens: The Heroines of Classic Horror an invaluable resource.
Nige Burton and Jamie Jones' encyclopedic, 68-page volume explodes with the great women who inspired many of their contemporary counterparts.
These talented, pioneering ladies range from the silent era through cinema's silver stretch and include Mary Philbin, Elsa Lanchester, Zita Johann, Helen Chandler, Frances Dade, Frances Drake, Mae Clarke, Valerie Hobson, Gloria Stuart, Gloria Holden, Nan Grey, Martha Mansfield, Miriam Hopkins, Ingrid Bergman, Maureen O'Hara, Carroll Borland, Brigitte Helm, Olga Baclanova, Fay Wray, Simone Simon, Kathleen Burke, Evelyn Ankers, Anne Gwynne, Jane Adams, Illona Massey and yes, more, more more!
Of course, respectful adoration also falls on the memorable movies in which they starred, such as King Kong, Frankenstein, Bride of Frankenstein, Dracula, Dracula's Daughter, Mark of the Vampire, The Mummy, The Wolf Man, The Old Dark House, The Invisible Man, The Invisible Man Returns, Frankenstein Meets the Wolfman, House of Frankenstein, House of Dracula, Metropolis, Mad Love, Cat People, Freaks, The Phantom of the Opera 1925, The Hunchback of Notre Dame 1939, Island of Lost Souls ... and Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde 1921, 1931 & 1941.
In addition to Burton & Jones' detailed overviews, this special edition features outstanding, photo reproductions of the actresses, along with their virile (and often sinister) costars, which makes this trip down memory lane all the more comprehensive and endearing.
If one loves old-time Hollywood and the women who distinguish it, Scream Sirens is an essential: an elaborate reference source that celebrates a cordial kind of nostalgia that only grows more vibrant with the passage of time.
Order Classic Monsters of the Movies' Scream Sirens at
https://www.classic-monsters.com/shop/product/scream-sirens-the-heroines-of-classic-horror-magazine/
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